India is one of the top-ranking countries in the field of basic research. India's current rise in science is as impressive as its economic surge in recent years and the country clearly has the potential to become the home for world class research, as per a study by Thomson Reuters titled 'Global Research Report: India'.

In a recent trend small technology firms are moving into the support space by offering free 24x7 technology support for their products bought by small and medium businesses (SMB) and home offices. These new start-up firms are gearing up to fill in the US$ 1 billion technology support market.

Space Technology

India is one of the few countries with expertise to conceptualise, design and manufacture satellites and the capability to launch them into space. In fact, it has the largest constellation of remote sensing satellites in the world.

The Department of Space has been allocated a total of US$ 1.47 billion (including a non-Plan US$ 205.93 million in the Budget 2011-12 – of which, US$ 458.34 million would be dedicated towards launching vehicles and related technologies.

As per a study by CII-Antrix-Deloitte, India is likely to increase its space spending by an average of 14.8 per cent annually in the next four years to touch US$ 2.13 billion by 2014. At present, the country is ranked sixth in terms of space budget and technological capabilities. As compared to the previous year, the Government has increased its space budget by around 22 per cent to US$ 1.23 billion for 2010, which is around 0.14 per cent of the GDP.

ANTRIX Corporation Ltd, ISRO has been conferred with the most prestigious Globe Sustainability Research Award 2010 by the Globe Forum, Stockholm, Sweden.

Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) successfully conducted the flight testing of its new generation high-performance sounding rocket on March 3, 2010 from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre (SDSC), SHAR.

In collaboration with the French National Space Agency, India plans to launch a satellite for monitoring sea water levels in 2011. The satellite, Saral, will carry an altimeter (ALTIKA) for studying the sea surface heights and an ARGOS payload, which is a satellite-based data collection platform.

Honeywell International expects sales in India to grow at about 15 per cent annually over the next five years, as a surging economy drives demand for industrial automation as well as aerospace and security systems.

Closer co-operation between Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) and UK's space programme for a broader and deeper partnership between the two countries has been called for by David Willetts, British Minister for Universities and Science.

ISRO is planning to send astronauts to space before the year 2015-16, said deputy project director of ISRO's Chandrayaan Mission Jaswinder Singh Khoral.